I bought a Wii-U after passing judgement on it initially.. It's a farking fun system.. ZombiU is one of the best games I've played in quite a long time.. New Super Mario Bros is awesome.. They need to optimize the OS a bit but Nintendo did a really great job with Wii-U.. The Gamepad is awesome also.

DoomPaul:But can I play the same Mario/Zelda/Metroid/Pokemon games on it that are on other Nintendo systems or will they at least make rehashes of previous Nintendo franchises?

It's a smaller version of the Nintendo Wii, so you'd be able to play the same Mario/Zelda/etc games that are available on the Nintendo Wii. Future versions of those titles will not be coming to this system, but the WiiU.

I don't really see the point in this system, or why they'd even spend money producing it.

styckx:I bought a Wii-U after passing judgement on it initially.. It's a farking fun system.. ZombiU is one of the best games I've played in quite a long time.. New Super Mario Bros is awesome.. They need to optimize the OS a bit but Nintendo did a really great job with Wii-U.. The Gamepad is awesome also.

Lumbar Puncture:DoomPaul: But can I play the same Mario/Zelda/Metroid/Pokemon games on it that are on other Nintendo systems or will they at least make rehashes of previous Nintendo franchises?

It's a smaller version of the Nintendo Wii, so you'd be able to play the same Mario/Zelda/etc games that are available on the Nintendo Wii. Future versions of those titles will not be coming to this system, but the WiiU.

I don't really see the point in this system, or why they'd even spend money producing it.

My thought was that the major seller for the system was exactly what they have given it; a half hearted shovelware box that you can plug and chug at the retirement home or similar places where the motion control for a series of simple games is the goal, not a full console experience.

They basically made a box to cater to the majority of their clients who already have one, and hope to break in a few places like doctors offices or such.

the_sidewinder:styckx: I bought a Wii-U after passing judgement on it initially.. It's a farking fun system.. ZombiU is one of the best games I've played in quite a long time.. New Super Mario Bros is awesome.. They need to optimize the OS a bit but Nintendo did a really great job with Wii-U.. The Gamepad is awesome also.

That's nice and all, but this isn't about the Wii U

Eat a dick asshole. As if anyone is going to sit here and discuss a 6 year old console.

If this is an advertisement it's a particularly bad one. You don't often see ads claiming "This is a savagely compromised version of the original hardware that we can only recommend to the least discerning of gamers."

styckx:the_sidewinder: styckx: I bought a Wii-U after passing judgement on it initially.. It's a farking fun system.. ZombiU is one of the best games I've played in quite a long time.. New Super Mario Bros is awesome.. They need to optimize the OS a bit but Nintendo did a really great job with Wii-U.. The Gamepad is awesome also.

That's nice and all, but this isn't about the Wii U

Eat a dick asshole. As if anyone is going to sit here and discuss a 6 year old console.

TFA is not about a 6 year old console. It's about a new one that also isn't the Wii-U.

Wasilla Hillbilly:I'm not sure it is. This is the first I've heard of the thing, at least.

Canadian here, too. Never heard of this thing before.

It's crap, but it's designed to BE crap. It's meant to be a bare-bones cheap alternative to their higher-ticket console. Sure, they cut out a lot of features, but that's pretty standard when making a cheaper version. This isn't like the new format for the PS3 where the purpose was to improve on the hardware and slim things down; this is meant to achieve a lower price point and thus a wider audience. And most of that audience probably isn't interested in the things they've cut out; enthusiasts who want to tap into retro games or their gamecube libraries have had 6 years to buy the existing Wii, which so far as I know is still going to be available anyway.

My first thought when I read about this review: there are parents out there who will think they're savvy consumers for getting the hot new Wii for cheap. Christmas morning, little Timmy will rip open his present and find a six-year-old console which can't even download the games (and day-one patches) his friends have, or play with those friends online.

It reminds me of an awkward Christmas morning when my older sister, an aspiring artist, found out that our parents had bought her Super Paint Shop X Illustrator, or whatever it was called. We were raised to be gracious for out gifts, even the ones we didn't like, but she had to explain to our parents that people in her circle used PhotoShop. They talked about techniques in PhotoShop, they shared brushes for PhotoShop, and they helped troubleshoot Photoshop. Buying her an inferior competitor wasn't almost as-good-as, it wasn't any good at all. It was particularly unpleasant for me because I could understand both sides, and while our parents meant well they just didn't understand what she was so upset about. Let's just say it was a touchy subject for that holiday, the software got crammed to the back of a drawer for eternity, and my sister successfully appealed to one of her friends for a pirated copy of the proper program.

First-world problems, I know, but it's painful to see good intentions and a not-insignificant amount of money fail so completely.

TeDDD:My first thought when I read about this review: there are parents out there who will think they're savvy consumers for getting the hot new Wii for cheap. Christmas morning, little Timmy will rip open his present and find a six-year-old console which can't even download the games (and day-one patches) his friends have, or play with those friends online.

It reminds me of an awkward Christmas morning when my older sister, an aspiring artist, found out that our parents had bought her Super Paint Shop X Illustrator, or whatever it was called. We were raised to be gracious for out gifts, even the ones we didn't like, but she had to explain to our parents that people in her circle used PhotoShop. They talked about techniques in PhotoShop, they shared brushes for PhotoShop, and they helped troubleshoot Photoshop. Buying her an inferior competitor wasn't almost as-good-as, it wasn't any good at all. It was particularly unpleasant for me because I could understand both sides, and while our parents meant well they just didn't understand what she was so upset about. Let's just say it was a touchy subject for that holiday, the software got crammed to the back of a drawer for eternity, and my sister successfully appealed to one of her friends for a pirated copy of the proper program.

First-world problems, I know, but it's painful to see good intentions and a not-insignificant amount of money fail so completely.

/not so CSB

Let's be fair, it's not at all uncommon for a company to bring out a redesigned "slim" console late in a console's lifespan, sometimes even concurrently with a successor's launch; Sony did the exact thing when they launched the redesigned "PSOne" alonside the PS2. The only real story is how utterly shiat Nintendo's attempt at this is.

As for savvy Grandma, if she didn't get fooled by this, she'd probably get fooled by one of those Chinese Wii knockoffs they sell at Walgreen's this time of year.

HeartBurnKid:Let's be fair, it's not at all uncommon for a company to bring out a redesigned "slim" console late in a console's lifespan, sometimes even concurrently with a successor's launch; Sony did the exact thing when they launched the redesigned "PSOne" alonside the PS2.

Not exactly, as the PSOne did not lack any features the PSX had. The Wii Mini lacks many.

Dragonflew:HeartBurnKid:Let's be fair, it's not at all uncommon for a company to bring out a redesigned "slim" console late in a console's lifespan, sometimes even concurrently with a successor's launch; Sony did the exact thing when they launched the redesigned "PSOne" alonside the PS2.

Not exactly, as the PSOne did not lack any features the PSX had. The Wii Mini lacks many.

The only thing that is similar is the sKim PS2 that lost the hard drive capability, but that add on was not really used by anyone that didn't play Final Fantasy online.

Dragonflew:HeartBurnKid:Let's be fair, it's not at all uncommon for a company to bring out a redesigned "slim" console late in a console's lifespan, sometimes even concurrently with a successor's launch; Sony did the exact thing when they launched the redesigned "PSOne" alonside the PS2.

Not exactly, as the PSOne did not lack any features the PSX had. The Wii Mini lacks many.

Well, like i said, Nintendo's version is kind of shiat.

But the PSOne was missing one feature the PSX did; it didn't have the expansion port on the back, which meant you couldn't use a GameShark on it (or, conveniently, a PlugMod).

mentaluproar:HeartBurnKidBut the PSOne was missing one feature the PSX did; it didn't have the expansion port on the back, which meant you couldn't use a GameShark on it (or, conveniently, a PlugMod).

Datel worked around that by releasing the Gameshark CDX, which ran like a TSR from the DOS days.

Well, yeah, but my little bootleg GameShark that I used to be able to swap discs out and run imports didn't work on it. Which meant my beloved copy of Fire Pro Wrestling G could not be played on a PS1. That displeased me greatly.

My guess? This was somebody's pet project that didn't get canceled until a handful of units were already produced, and they decided to dump them quietly in Canada in order to get rid of them with a minimum of embarrassment. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as "a minimum of embarrassment" on the internet.

HeartBurnKid:Malcolm_Sex: Can someone explain why it got a Canada-first release? Thats usually reserved for maple syrup and beer.

My guess? This was somebody's pet project that didn't get canceled until a handful of units were already produced, and they decided to dump them quietly in Canada in order to get rid of them with a minimum of embarrassment. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as "a minimum of embarrassment" on the internet.